As a reminder. The reticles in SFP scopes aren't just "intelligent" at full power. At half power they are as well. On my big NF, that's 11x. So if I'm having mirage or low-light issues I can turn it to 11x and now my 2 MOA hashes (MOAR reticle) are 4 MOA. Still easy. I've yet to see a mirage problem that doesn't clear up at 11x.
Further, it gets mentioned that a FFP scope's reticle can function as a ruler. So can a SFP scope, on full power or 1/2 power. So a guy could, for instance, use the scope on full power to measure out what say a 3 MOA wind hold looks like relative to the target. Then put it on ANY power setting and just hold to that POA.
In these discussions guys tend to default to absolutes, a fault of the Internet in general I suppose, but in reality a SFP scope can do the things a FFP scope can. Might just be a bit slower, or take a skootch more thought, which granted aren't positives. But it's all perfectly doable.
Just sayin'.
I can buy that. But if time matters, I personally like to stack the odds in front of me. I would hate to have to jump through all of those hoops looking at a trophy of a lifetime hoping it doesn't move/run.
Thanks for the reasonable reply.
It's not a lot of hoops, and at least for this lunk, a LR shot on game (where this stuff would even matter) isn't a rushed affair anyway. There's a bunch of stuff to do in terms of getting in a solid position and it's not difficult to multitask a bit and, say, determine that your wind hold is "1/3,l of a deer body" as you are getting set. Once you know that, it doesn't matter where your power ring is set.
Also, it's not hard to project an approximate idea of say "one MOA" onto say a deer. Pretend it's at 602 yards (my longest kill). An MOA is ~ 6" and 2 MOA is 12". I know what a dinner plate looks like on a deer body. Know what I mean? That's not hard... And finally wind calls are such a judgement thing anyway. In competition, sure, as you move through the course of fire you might determine that to keep it in the X ring your call is 2.3 MOA or whatever it is. In HUNTING, you look at the vegetation, mirage, ideally any condensate (clouds) that are relevant, try to combine everything you are seeing into a number... a wind about 8-10 mph coming from over my right shoulder, with terrain features that might induce a bit of an updraft, but the grass moving where the DEER is shows some gusty stuff from the LEFT! So what's the call there, and how does a FFP scope really matter? You gotta make the call for your one shot, you gotta get really set positionally, and in the case of SFP you need to crank it up all the way, or halfway, and get a read on what your call looks like in terms of POA.
All that takes some time anyway and personally I have not found SFP to be much, if any, of a handicap.
I'm not dissing FFP. All I'm doing is mildly and hopefully politely contesting the notion that SFP is a big handicap in real life big game hunting situations.
The only 2 FFP scopes I've played with, the reticles were useless at minimum power. However, I'm prepared to believe my friends that the 3-9 SS and 3-12 LRHS have solved that.
